Paramount+ The Good Fight - Seasons 3 & 4 (CBS All Access) (1 Viewer)

[Johnny Angell]

I never watched The Good Wife, nor The Good Wife. We have CBS AA. Could we start watching season 1 and know where we are and enjoy it? Yeah, that’s subjective, but I welcome opinions.

 

[Hollywoodaholic]

I never watched The Good Wife but definitely enjoyed Seasons 1 and 2 of The Good Fight without knowing the backstory. Great actors working with great material and some crazy ass stories.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

I never watched The Good Wife, nor The Good Wife. We have CBS AA. Could we start watching season 1 and know where we are and enjoy it? Yeah, that’s subjective, but I welcome opinions.

You'll get more out of it if you've seen "The Good Wife", but they're very different shows. Only two main characters and one fan favorite recurring character crossed over to the new series -- which takes place at a completely different law firm. So if you start with the pilot for "The Good Fight" you should be alright.

 

[Mike Frezon]

And, The Good Wife is a great show to binge. I remember binging the first several seasons until I caught up with the live broadcasts.

There are a lot of different story arcs all going on at the same time which, for me, is something that makes binging all the more satisfying.

Plus, The Good Wife is a great show...period.

I am enjoying The Good Fight (I have been viewing the show when the discs are released) but it is a different animal than The Good Wife. TGF is much more political than TGW which spent much more of its time in the courtroom.

 

[Steve Armbrust]

I'm binging The Good Fight now. It's a wild ride that I'm enjoying immensely. Love the Trump pee-pee tape episide.

 

[Johnny Angell]

I'm binging The Good Fight now. It's a wild ride that I'm enjoying immensely. Love the Trump pee-pee tape episide.

Ohhh. I think you just pushed me over the edge to watch the GF.

 

[Johnny Angell]

We have just completed season 3. Is it just me or the series getting weirder as the seasons roll by. I like that the GF can tackle subjects that a broadcast series can. But it’s getting weird. With Season 4, it’s almost like there’s a new show runner. First we get a dream episode and then we get a huge change is circumstances for the firm.

I’m not a big fan of conspiracy story arcs. So, still watching, but not liking it as much. Roland Blum, I really hate his character and not in a good way. They good drop him and I’d be happy.

 

[Matt Hough]

I just finished watching Season 4 last night. Spoilers ahead for those who haven't watched season four.

First, I know the show has been using the F-Bomb since the very first episode with Diane watching the inauguration, but this season they seemed to go overboard with its use, multiple times in each episode to the point where it's annoying. These are educated, sophisticated people who should be able to find other expletives to express their dismay or to emphasize points.

The truncated season didn't allow us to have any wrap ups with the John Larouquette firm overriding story arc, Cush Jumbo's million dollar windfall, or Delroy Lindo's presidential ambitions, the latter two of which should have allowed them to write them gracefully out of the series since they didn't resign for season five of the show. We also got no closure on Memo 618.

I did love the mystery surrounding Jeffrey Epstein's cryptic clues and afterlife that served as the season finale. Great final reveal of BUD.

 

[Josh Dial]

First, I know the show has been using the F-Bomb since the very first episode with Diane watching the inauguration, but this season they seemed to go overboard with its use, multiple times in each episode to the point where it's annoying. These are educated, sophisticated people who should be able to find other expletives to express their dismay or to emphasize points.

I'm a lawyer at a large international law firm. Almost everyone at my shop swears like sailors. For some files, on some days, it's like breathing...

 

[Johnny Angell]

Wait a minute. Are these newly released episodes?

 

[Mike Frezon]

Season Four came crashing to a halt during Covid, Johnny. They had to pull the plug on production.

 

[Johnny Angell]

Season Four came crashing to a halt during Covid, Johnny. They had to pull the plug on production.

Yes, I remember that and we had watched all there was. It seemed lime Matt was saying there were now more episodes.

 

[Matt Hough]

Yes, I remember that and we had watched all there was. It seemed lime Matt was saying there were now more episodes.

No, I just said I had watched season four which was, if you recall, seven episodes. I'm assuming the season was meant to be ten episodes, but I've never read for sure if they were going for eight, nine, or ten.

 

[Matt Hough]

I'm a lawyer at a large international law firm. Almost everyone at my shop swears like sailors. For some files, on some days, it's like breathing...

Thanks for schooling me. I had no idea this was the case.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Finally caught up through the end of the third season. I will read up on everybody's thoughts once I've made it through the abbreviated fourth season.

I enjoyed it a lot, but I think the show will actually be better once Trump leaves office. "The Good Wife" was a really good examination of an entire system: the political and legal machine of Chicago. The national figures were all real, but Illinois politics was largely populated by fictional characters. "The Good Fight", in its desire to be topical, sometimes feels like it's chasing headlines instead of speaking to larger ideas.

On the other hand, it's probably the best show being made right now for speaking to the tragic absurdity of the current moment.

I continue to really love Diane and Kurt's marriage.

I really enjoyed Maia's exit, too; in the ocean of life, she's decided she would rather be a shark than a minnow. One advantage of this show, built around an idea rather than a focal character, is that it can evolve as it needs to. There has been a ton of cast turnover, and it's mostly been for the better. I was glad that Roland Blum was a one-season character, too. He was fun at times, but he took up too much oxygen and his theatricality would get old fast.

I love that they got a relatively unknown working actor with a supporting role on "Downton Abbey" to play a fictionalized version of himself. It's so delightfully random.

Was that Gina Gershon playing the woman who may or may not have been Melania Trump?

That ending, with the SWAT team flooding in, was a doozy. Surely the ringleaders of the "Book Club" are going to prison sooner or later? They got increasingly more brazen as the season wore on, and assuming Diane doesn't get killed like the immigration guy did, she can surely testify against them for -- at minimum -- conspiracy to retaliate against a witness, victim, or informant.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Just finished the truncated Season 4. I enjoyed it a lot; the Trump stuff took a bit more of a backseat, and the politics of the firm getting acquired and the cases of the week -- a strength on "The Good Wife" but not usually as emphasized on this show -- felt stronger.

Given that both Delroy Lindo and Cush Jumbo were scheduled to leave at the end of the fourth season, though, it does put them in a spot. There were certainly story elements that pointed to how they might be written out, but it definitely hadn't happened by the end of episode seven. Jumbo is on record as saying that she is willing to return to wrap up Lucca's story if scheduling permits it; Lindo is leaving to headline another series, so it might be trickier to get him back.

I really enjoyed John Larroquette as the firm's new corporate overlord. Gavin Firth is sort of the anti-Dan Fielding: efficient, not prone to overstatement, the kind of man who sticks the knife in you without you ever even seeing it coming.

I wasn't sure about bringing Zach Grenier back as David Lee, but the radically different circumstances of this firm allow him to play different notes than he got to play with "The Good Wife". David and Lucca were a fun pairing.

Keeping Michael Boatman on as a series regular with Julius Cain as first a judge and then a client instead of a partner at the firm was an unorthodox but effective development.

Memo 618 doesn't exist (as far as I know, and none of us would know if it was real, would we?) but as poetic composite of all the ways that politics, power, and influence corrupt the legal system, it was a rather elegant plot device. And while the abuses under it may be more widespread under Bill Barr's DOJ, the episode with the court stenographer made it clear that this is something that has existed in The Good Wife universe since at least FDR's presidency, if not earlier. And the Jeffrey Epstein episode made it clear that it was what protected him through the nineties and early 21st century. So the show's transition to a Biden presidency probably wouldn't make the issue go away.

Is it just me or the series getting weirder as the seasons roll by. I like that the GF can tackle subjects that a broadcast series can. But it’s getting weird. With Season 4, it’s almost like there’s a new show runner. First we get a dream episode and then we get a huge change is circumstances for the firm.

The show is definitely way more surreal than "The Good Wife", and that show had plenty of surreal moments of its own. But then, the world is more surreal than when "The Good Wife" was made, so I guess this show is just following reality down the rabbit hole.

I didn't miss the musical interludes when they were gone for most of Season 4, however, clever though they were.

The truncated season didn't allow us to have any wrap ups with the John Larouquette firm overriding story arc, Cush Jumbo's million dollar windfall, or Delroy Lindo's presidential ambitions, the latter two of which should have allowed them to write them gracefully out of the series since they didn't resign for season five of the show. We also got no closure on Memo 618.

Yes, there is a lot up in the air heading into Season 5. I actually do think that the firm acquisition storyline and Julius Cain's storyline ended at good places for a season finale; whatever happens next in both storylines will be radically changed by the developments in this episode.

It seems likely that Hugh Dancy will return as Caleb, too, since his two storylines -- the flirtation with Marissa, and the inappropriate relationship with Liz -- just sort of got dropped.

I did love the mystery surrounding Jeffrey Epstein's cryptic clues and afterlife that served as the season finale. Great final reveal of BUD.

Yes, the fact that -- after all of the various breadcrumbs leading in various bizarre directions got them no closer to determining whether Epstein was murdered or committed suicide -- the reveal of the truth behind "BUD" being so absolutely absurd felt right somehow. And given Epstein's obsession with legacy (or at least the fictionalized Epstein of the show), the truth about BUD might actually make suicide more likely.

Season Four came crashing to a halt during Covid, Johnny. They had to pull the plug on production.

Apparently they were four days into production on the eighth episode when production was halted. Three scenes shot for episode eight -- including Julius's arrest -- that were originally shot for the eighth episode were edited into the seventh episode to help it better serve as a season finale.

No, I just said I had watched season four which was, if you recall, seven episodes. I'm assuming the season was meant to be ten episodes, but I've never read for sure if they were going for eight, nine, or ten.

When CBSViacom announced the fifth season, they confirmed that the fourth season was originally slated to have ten episodes before the pandemic shut everything down. Certain storylines, like Memo 618, are being expanded to continue across the upcoming season.